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June 25, 2004/Tamuz 6 5764, Vol. 56, No. 40
Interfaith issues complicate infertility
Several years ago I led a support group for women experiencing infertility.
As often happened in such groups, members got to talking about why they were being "punished" with infertility.
Spontaneously, the women began to offer up explanations for their suffering. One Jewish woman said, "I am being punished for intermarrying." The woman sitting next to her, also Jewish, said, "But I married a Jew. I guess I am being punished for marrying within the faith."
Many things have changed in the 15 years that have passed since I witnessed this spontaneous confessional - and other things have stayed the same. Intermarriage is much more common. However, as reproductive medicine has gone "high- tech," new sentiments and new dilemmas are arising for interfaith couples encoun-tering infertility.
Infertility, and the anguish that accompanies it, afflicted Judaism's founding mothers. Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, and Hannah all faced the pain of involuntary childlessness and all prayed to God with prayers that were answered.
In talking with interfaith couples, I have often found that the partners have different perspectives on God and on the role of prayer. My Catholic clients often talk of "the man upstairs," referring to God as something of a master puppeteer in charge of all that occurs in people's lives. Some of my Jewish clients, by contrast, perceive themselves as having a much greater "say" in determining their destiny. Other Jews, like some of the women in my long-ago support group, see infertility as punishment, while still others simply accept a "bad things happen to good people" perspective.
What does it mean to be unable to be fruitful and multiply? As the world knows all too well, Hitler's mission was to eradicate the Jewish people. Thankfully, his efforts ultimately failed. Many documentaries on the Holocaust include mention of the countless lives that were generated from each survivor.
Even for those whose families were not personally decimated by the Holocaust, there is a feeling of wanting to bring new Jewish children into the world.
One infertile Jewish couple who recently turned to sperm donation came upon a sperm donor whose reason for donating prompted them to feel very good about their decision to use donor sperm. On a donor questionnaire, their donor indicated that he was the son of Holocaust survivors and wanted to donate so that he could "populate the world" as much as he could.
For the non-Jewish member of an interfaith couple, the desire to replenish the Jewish people may not be personally compelling. However, those who have agreed - usually long in advance of attempting pregnancy - to raise their children as Jews will have some sense of what it means for their partner to bear children that contribute to Jewish continuity.
At the dawn of the 21st century, we have many options, including egg donation, embryo donation and various forms of surrogacy. These brave new frontiers of reproduction are fundamentally altering the structure of families, and they provide some curious twists and turns for interfaith couples.
Just as there are Jewish sperm donors, so also are there Jewish egg donors. Recently I met with an interfaith couple who was delighted to have found a Jewish donor. The non-Jewish wife spoke of her strong identification with Judaism, something that had predated her marriage. She said that she had thought about conversion but had done nothing about it. When she met and married a Jewish man, she said, she no longer felt a need to convert "because now I could have Jewish children." She went on to say that, for her, the Jewish egg donor completed the circle. The child she is expecting will "have real, Jewish genes."
Since gay couples are now having and adopting children, it is not surprising that they, too, have their interfaith issues.
I recently met with a woman who plans to be a gestational carrier - a woman who carries and delivers a baby that is not her biological child - for a gay couple. In interviewing her, I learned that this will be her second experience carrying for a gay couple and she noted that this couple, like her last, includes a Jewish partner and Christian. When I asked if religious affiliations came up in her last experience, she said that they did. "Since only one of the men could be the biological father and each set of grandparents wanted the child raised in their faith, the men decided not to tell anyone which one of them fathered the child. That way, they were free to choose whether to have a bris or a baptism," she said.
And so we see that for interfaith couples encount-ering infertility, complex issues of faith and lineage arise amidst an array of medical and emotional challenges. Thankfully, many couples find that the experience of grappling with these issues strengthens their relationship, fortifying it for the long-wished-for terrain of parenthood.
Ellen S. Glazer is a social worker specializing in in-fertility, adoption, pregnancy loss and parenting.
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